A feeding frenzy at Christie's New York on Tuesday night led to the most profitable Impressionist and modern art sale for 16 years.

Van Gogh's L'Arlésienne, Madame Ginoux, went under the hammer for $40.3m (£21.9m), the fourth largest amount paid for a Van Gogh at auction.

Painted in 1890, towards the end of the artist's life, it is part of a series of six L'Arlésiennes paintings and the only remaining work left in private hands. A Picasso in the sale fetched $34.7m (£18.9m). The painting, Le Repos, is a portrait of the artist's wife, the Russian ballerina Olga Khokhlova. It was painted in 1932.

Works by Kandinsky, Monet, Pissarro, Sisley and Tamara de Lempicka were also sold at the auction, which made a total of $180.3m (£98m).